How to mine Zcash with CPU (Linux)

Antonio Madeira
14 Nov 2016

ZCash is an anonymous cryptocurrency that uses zk-snarks to ensure that all the information regarding user transactions is safely encrypted, while still verifiable by miners that can ensure no double-spending has taken place using zero knowledge proofs.

ZCash uses Equihash as an hashing algorithm, which is an asymmetric memory-hard PoW algorithm based on the generalized birthday problem. It relies on high RAM requirements to bottleneck the generation of proofs and making ASIC development unfeasible, much like Ethereum.

In order to avoid Instamine ZCash will have a slow mining start, where block rewards will be issued slowler than normal.

We are going to show you how to mine ZCash on Ubuntu. To mine ZCash on Windows click here. You can also try mining with cloud mining contract with Genesis Mining or Hashflare.

Not everyone has access to a computer, however, and not everyone has the time, knowledge or patience to start mining Zcash on their own, especially since there is no Graphic User Interface (GUI) Miner available yet. If you want to mine on your own computer, but need a little push to do so, you're in the right place.But if you're looking to profit from Zcash mining with no effort at all, this guide will do the trick.

Mining ZCash on Linux (Ubuntu) - ONLY WORKS FOR 64BIT SYSTEMS

Part 1 - Installing the ZCash system package dependencies

Step 1: Open your terminal. This can be done by clicking the upper leftlogo (1) and searching for "Terminal". Click the Terminal logo (2).

Step 2: First install the dependencies required by Zcash. This can be done by typing the following into the command line:

Step 3: Now edit your configuration file "zcash.conf" and add one line to it: "gen=1" and save the document.

Step 4: Run the ZCash deamon again by entering the command: "./src/zcashd -daemon". again

And that's it! You are now officially mining ZCash testcoins. You will not see your hashrate displayed, or any information regarding it, but you can check your balance and other blockchain info by typing and entering the command: "./src/zcash-cli getinfo". It may take a while to get new testcoins, so if you're not you've done everything correctly, make sure that your config file has the "gen=1" line and wait for a few hours before checking your balance.

Enter the command: "./src/zcash-cli listunspent" to get more detailed info on your testcoins and wallet.

Mining ZCash on Windows

ZCash currently does not support Windows, nor will it do so for the 1.0 launch. A version with Windows support is scheduled for the following release. If you're a Windows user and want to mine ZCash, you can either Install Linux on a Virtual Machine or wait for the windows release. If you do decide to run Zcash on a virtual machine, you just need to follow the instructions on this video. After Ubuntu is installed on a virtual machine, just follow the instructions on this guide from the start